Heroes: Season 2 Review

Was the strike-shortened second season plagued by a sophomore slump?

[Editor's Note: Up until last month, it was unclear whether we would be getting any more new episodes of Heroes this season. Now that the writers' strike is over and NBC's decided to not air any more new episodes until next season, we've decided to review the strike-shortened season two of Heroes.]

Now several months removed from the final episode of the second season of Heroes, it's difficult to recall what there was I enjoyed from the eleven episodes that aired before the writers' strike began. On the flip side, it is very, very easy to remember everything that frustrated and aggravated me in the series' second year. And that, of course, is the best example of the kind of season this was. I mean, when the show's creator and head writer feels compelled to publicly apologize for the choices he made with the direction of season two, you know there's going to be more bad than good.

From the get-go, storylines became monotonous and the pacing dragged. The series took several of the familiar characters and basically repeated their story arcs from the season before. Claire was one such character, who once again had to hide her abilities and returned to being a nobody at a new school. In a similar vein, we had to once again watch Peter discover his abilities as he was suffering from amnesia. While the writers did their best to make these stories interesting, it was material that viewers had already seen a version of in season one. After establishing itself as a series that kept the pace quick and kept stories moving forward, these choices felt like a big step backwards.

Alejandro consoles a noticeably upset Maya, frustrated by the lack of development in their storyline.

Even new characters quickly became tired and repetitive. I am, of course, referring to the sibling pair of Maya and Alejandro. Interesting at first -- her power to kill was counterbalanced by his power to heal -- the duo suffered from virtually no advancement in their story for the first several episodes. They'd be running for the border, Maya would uncontrollably kill someone, Alejandro would save them and then they'd continue running. Adding Sylar to the mix helped a bit, but not enough for viewers to ever really care that much for the brother and sister.